They appeared at the house, after waiting all those weeks,
on Miss Verinder's birthday; and they were rewarded for the patient
accuracy of their calculations by seeing the Moonstone in the bosom of
her dress! When I heard the story of the Colonel and the Diamond, later
in the evening, I felt so sure about the risk Mr. Franklin Blake had run
(they would have certainly attacked him, if he had not happened to ride
back to Lady Verinder's in the company of other people); and I was so
strongly convinced of the worse risk still, in store for Miss Verinder,
that I recommended following the Colonel's plan, and destroying the
identity of the gem by having it cut into separate stones. How its
extraordinary disappearance that night, made my advice useless, and
utterly defeated the Hindoo plot--and how all further action on the part
of the Indians was paralysed the next day by their confinement in prison
as rogues and vagabonds--you know as well as I do. The first act in
the conspiracy closes there. Before we go on to the second, may I
ask whether I have met your difficulty, with an explanation which is
satisfactory to the mind of a practical man?"
It was impossible to deny that he had met my difficulty fairly; thanks
to his superior knowledge of the Indian character--and thanks to his
not having had hundreds of other Wills to think of since Colonel
Herncastle's time!
"So far, so good," resumed Mr.
Pages:
532
533
534
535
536
537
538
539
540
541
542
543
544
545
546
547
548
549
550
551
552
553
554
555
556